Overwritten

[My mother](http://blog.sheepthrillsfarm.com) had [back surgery this week](http://blog.sheepthrillsfarm.com/2007/06/message-from-shepherdess.html) (on my Thursday), so I spent some time talking to her and my father. Everything went very well, and she’s recovering at home. She’s very mobile but has to keep from “doing too much” like she always does.

This must have been a great week for writing, because I feel like I wrote all the time!

**Thesis monster**
I still haven’t been getting up at 5am – I think I managed it once this week. However I have been working on my introduction during a little downtime at work. It’s coming along nicely. This is mostly due to my many previous introduction drafts which were restructured by my supervisors [back in November](http://www.steamedpuddings.net/2006/12/thesis-update/). I still have all of the text, so I’m just re-jiggering it to make it flow more nicely. It does need a lot of polish at this point, but it is happening.

Kiwiman pitched in, amazingly, and offered me some good concrete suggestions on writing specific parts of this beast. He has been very nice about offering supervisor-like feedback while still sounding like my husband and not my supervisor. I imagine this is still very frustrating for him, but he seems satisfied with the concept of pushing me along.

**”Postdoc” life**
At the end of last week I excitedly offered to help my boss with his project management work (which he admits he hates and I admit I love). Monday found me writing an end-of-year report which was supposed to be through our internal systems by Friday. Friday was, in fact, the first time the boss had the time to look at what I had written (I’d finished halfway through Wednesday). He is way behind with our work and it’s holding up several paper drafts that are next in line. I hope next week sees him be a bit more productive as the year-end mess passes over us.

Things are afoot with my contract and my job responsibilities, but I will not know any more than idle speculation until I talk to the Big Boss in the coming week. This situation has the potential to cause problems for others but to be very good for me. I’d best shut up about it now.

**Geeking out**
*(checks [del.icio.us](http://del.icio.us/Arachne) and [my Google Reader shared items](http://www.google.com/reader/shared/user/02016728523431671092/state/com.google/broadcast) for anything notable I’ve bookmarked in the last week)*

I must have been too busy working to do too much geek stuff this week. I might have to reconsider this category in my weekly updates because my geek activity seems to come in cycles.

I didn’t even spend that much time on Facebook this week, although I did get the surprise of the year when my half-sister added me as a Facebook friend. We have never really kept in touch before this point. I am pleased to be back in contact, but it will take me a while to get used to having a “new” family member. She is married with two teenage children, so I have a niece and nephew to get to know as well. Unfortunately they are in a part of the US that I am unlikely to visit anytime soon, so electronic communication will have to do for now.

**Yummiest meal**
To be honest, the spaghetti bolognese I had from the cafeteria for lunch on Friday was actually much better than I expected. The sauce was nice and salty, which I appreciated. Maybe I was just craving salt. We had another roast vegetable salad this week of which I think I will never tire. Hmm…homemade soup from Val? It’s been raining here, so it’s now soup season.

**Gripe of the week**
New Zealand has absolutely **sucked** in sporting events this week: we’ve lost two [America's Cup](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_America%27s_Cup) races and a rugby test against Australia. Get it together, guys.

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